“We believe political message reach should be earned, not bought.”
Twitter has banned all political advertising worldwide, according to the website’s CEO Jack Dorsey.
Dorsey posted a thread on his own personal Twitter account on Wednesday night, explaining the reasoning behind their decision.
He said: “Political message earns reach when people decide to follow an account or retweet.
“Paying for reach removes that decision, forcing highly optimised and targeted political messages on people. We believe this decision should not be compromised by money.”
He continued by saying that ads in support of voter registration will still be allowed, and that the new policy would be in place by 22 November.
He finished the thread by saying: “This isn’t about free expression. This is about paying for reach. And paying to increase the reach of political speech has significant ramifications that today’s democratic infrastructure may not be prepared to handle. It’s worth stepping back in order to address.”
You can read the thread in full here:
We’ve made the decision to stop all political advertising on Twitter globally. We believe political message reach should be earned, not bought. Why? A few reasons…🧵
— jack (@jack) October 30, 2019
Social media rival Facebook recently ruled out a ban on political ads, while owner Mark Zuckerberg was recently grilled by congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez regarding their policy on the subject.
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